


a thousand slowly dying sunsets

by ShyAudacity



Series: The Trauma Squad [1]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Anxiety, Cuddling & Snuggling, Eliza Martha and Gwash are all mentioned, Established Relationship, Flashbacks, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Health Issues, Moving, Multi, Pets, Polyamory, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Seizures, Thunderstorms, Trauma, Withdrawal, implied trans Lafayette, its not mentioned but John is a mechanic, oh yeah Henry Laurens is mentioned too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-14
Updated: 2016-09-14
Packaged: 2018-08-15 02:13:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8038225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShyAudacity/pseuds/ShyAudacity
Summary: All of them deal with the grief of their trauma differently. OR Alex/John/Lafayette + Bad things = The trauma squadWarnings in the tags, more to come.





	a thousand slowly dying sunsets

**Author's Note:**

> This is unbeta'd and please tell me if I missed any tags. I don't own anything.

Alex walks into his apartment and finds John sitting on the floor, holding onto to Lafayette like he’ll break should he decide to let go.

“It’s okay, it’s okay Gil. You’re okay.” He repeats over and over again, stroking his arms all the while. John never calls him that unless something is wrong. Alex makes a mental note to approach the two of them carefully. He sets his work bag down by the door, the crouches before advancing towards his lovers.

“John?” he whispers. “Can I come over there?”

He nods, mouthing the word _flashback_. Alex nods back, then shuffles over on his knees. The closer he gets, the more he realizes that Laf is mumbling under his breath.

“Stop. Stop. Cant. Stop.” His voice quietly trembling, just like his hands. His gaze trained on something that isn’t there.

“Laf?”

The mumbling halts for a moment, only to pick back up again, slower this time. Alex keeps a few feet of space between himself and Laf. He does, however, reach out and tap the hand closest to him. Even in his daze, the hand turns face up and Alex lays his fingers inside of it. Subconsciously, Laf allows his hand to curl around Alex’s. John looks at him warily.

“How long?” he mouths.

John holds up both of his hands, and he nods, knowing that Laf is likely to come out of it soon. A couple minutes later, he jerks in John’s grip, then looks around blearily. His gaze lands on John, then Alex, and he sags visibly.

“Alex?” he tightens his grip ever so slightly.

“Yeah, yeah I’m here. It’s me sweet boy. You back with us?”

He nods slowly, then pulls Alex closer to him, he complies.

“Can you tell us what triggered you?” John asks, resting his chin on Laf’s shoulder. “If you can’t talk about it right now, that’s okay. We just want to know what to avoid for the future. Okay?”

Laf nods, then whispers. “Precious…don’t call me precious.”

Both John and Alex nod, then take turns kissing his cheeks until he deems himself strong enough to stand and take himself to bed.

 ***********************

All of them deal with the grief of their trauma differently. Laf has heard from eye witness that he can be harmful to himself at times. So he makes it a point to have someone he trusts around him as often as possible, in case he should have a panic attack or slip into a flashback. He trusts his friends, and lovers, to know what touches are good and bad in moments like those.

Alex has always been vocal about his anxiety. Isn’t ashamed of the fact, he’d embraced it years ago and now he just rolls with the punches. Some days are better than others. On the bad days, he’ll hide away in their bed or ask one of them to dig their hands into his muscles in a nearly painful manner until the panic ceases.

John, on the other hand, doesn’t like to be touched while he’s having a panic attack. He’d rather lock himself in the bathroom, and wait it out. Yet, as soon as it’s over, he’ll crawl into the first pair of open arms he can find. Sometimes, he cries while being held, more often than not, he’ll fall asleep to someone’s hand in his hair.

 *********************************

“Do you guys think that we should move out of the city?” John asks one day.

Alex and Laf both gape at him. It’s the first thing that he’s said all day, and they’re surprised that that’s what he decided to spew out.

“Why do you ask?” Alex asks.

He shrugs. “I don’t know. All of us have lived in the city for a while. I just thought that a change might be good. For all of us.”

“But you hate change.”

“Yeah, but you guys don’t.”

Alex looks back at Laf, who just shrugs at him.

“Let’s talk about it more over dinner tonight, okay?”

John nods. They all return to what they had been doing.

 ********************

John and Alex have known each other since they were in high school. So they have kind of a sixth sense for when the other one is in trouble. It’s come in handy more than once during the three years that they’ve been dating.

There was one instance, just after Laf came into their lives/relationship, that sticks out in Alex’s mind. He’d had a sour feeling in his mouth all day and couldn’t seem to pin point it. When he got home. Laf was on the couch watching TV.

“Hey, where’s John?” He asked.

“Bedroom. He said that he wasn’t feeling too well.”

Alex walked into the bedroom to find John on the floor, shaking like he was caught in a blizzard, mere inches away from the bed.

“Oh my god, John.” He exclaimed. Dropping to his knees, he rolled John onto his back only to find his eyes half open and tear filled. “John?”

“My m-meds.” He said through chattering teeth. “Pharmacy didn’t have them d-didn’t have them.”

 _Shit_ he thought. It was Friday, and Monday was a holiday, everything would be closed until Tuesday. This weekend was going to be hell for John. Alex pulled him into his embrace, holding him as best he could through the tremors. Alex had seen him off his valium before, but never for more than a day. His withdrawals had never been this severe, he never could have imagined how the rest of the weekend played out.

John spent the rest of Friday night tremoring and sweating like he’d run a marathon. Saturday, he locked himself in the bedroom for most of the day, refusing to give a reason why. He later admitted that he’d been hallucinating and thought that his father had been there. He was too afraid to say something for fear of it being true.

By Sunday morning, they all thought that John was in the clear, thought that the worst of it was over. Then, while in the kitchen with Lafayette, he’d dropped to the floor and started having a seizure. Alex called an ambulance, which took John to the hospital where they were able to get him back on his medication.

Needless to say, he hasn’t missed a dosage since then.

 ***********************

Over dinner, the three of them go over the pros and cons of moving out of the city.

Cons: It’d be a bit of a further drive to work for Alex and Laf. Rent would be higher. They’d be farther from the close resources they already have, like friends, the pharmacy, grocery store, etc. No guaranteed parking spots, either.

Pros: The scenery of having the woods at the edge of town would be pretty. They wouldn’t have to worry about being too loud, or having noisy and annoying neighbors. John could finally get the pet turtle that he’s always talked about getting.

They don’t make a definitive decision just yet. Laf does, however, stop Alex after dinner, asking to talk to him.

“I think I know why John suggested that we move out of the city.”

“Okay?”

“Washington told me a few days ago that there was a politician from South Carolina who was planning on opening up a campaign office here in town.”

Alex furrowed his brow.

“The guys name is Henry Laurens.”

His eyes widened. “John told me once that his father was a politician.”

Laf nodded.

“I’ll go talk to him.”

 *********************************

“Do you guys want to meet up for lunch?” Lafayette suggested at Breakfast. “There’s a new restaurant downtown with outdoor seating. I heard it’s supposed to be really nice.”

“But it’s supposed to rain today.” Alex said.

“Okay, then we’ll eat inside.”

“It’s going to _rain,_ Laf.”

“Okay? What’s the big deal? It’s just rain, that never hurt anybody.”  

Alex sucked in a harsh breath, then walked away towards the bedroom, leaving a confused Laf alone with John.

“Did I say something?”

“He hasn’t told you yet, has he?”

“Told me what?”

“Before he moved to the states, there was a hurricane that hit his hometown. It wiped out half of the city and most of the people. He doesn’t really like to talk about it much, but he won’t to work if there’s the slightest chance of it rain. Mr. Washington knows about it, so he probably already knows that he won’t be at the office today.”

“Shit. Oh my god, I should have known.” Laf said. He went into the bedroom and found Alex face down on the bed, his head covered by a pillow. Laf laid down next to him, throwing an arm over his waist.

“I’m sorry for being insensitive.” He whispered. “I didn’t know about the storm.”

“It’s fine, I shoulda told you.” came a muffled voice from under the pillow. “You should get going, you don’t wanna be late for work.”

Laf sighed, kissed his neck, then left for work.

Once he got there, he found it impossible to concentrate. Just like Alex had said, it started raining not even an hour after he got to work. Every time the thunder rolled, he looked at his phone, expecting Alex to call him asking that he come home. By noon, he’d given up, too distracted to work. He told Washington that he wasn’t feeling well, then got in his car and sped back the apartment.

He walked in, and John was holding a trembling Alex. Wrapped around him from behind like a koala, they sat on the couch, facing away from the windows. Alex screwed shut tightly, as if he’d find himself living inside of a nightmare should he choose to open them. John was whispering in his ear.

“It’s okay. It’s not real, you’re not there. The storm can’t get you, okay? You’re not there, baby girl, you’re here, at home, with me.” John looked up at Laf and nodded.

“Lafayette is here. All of us are safe, Alex. It can’t hurt us.”

Laf sat on the couch, grabbing one of Alex’s hands in both of his. He kissed his knuckles, then watched the tension begin to dissipate in his shoulders. He cracked his watery eyes open, and smiled shyly at Laf, who smiled right back.

“I love you.” he mouthed.

“I love you too.” Laf mouthed back. The storm passed 20 minutes later, but the three of them spent the rest of the afternoon on the couch, just holding each other.

 ******************************************

Alex found John in their bedroom, going through his drawers.

“What are you doing?”

“Looking for my turtle socks. I couldn’t find them this morning.”

“Top drawer.” He reminded him. “You Laf was just telling me about a conversation that he had with Washington a couple of days ago.”

“Yeah?” John asked, still searching for the socks.

“Yeah. I guess there’s a politician from South Carolina who wants to open a campaign office here in town. Oddly enough, he has the same last name as you.”

John’s shoulders tensed up. He gripped the green socks in his hand like his life depended on it.

“Is that why you suggested moving out of the city? Because of your old man?”

“My sister called me the other day.” he whispered. “I didn’t tell any of them that we moved here, or that you work with Washington. I’m too terrified to tell Martha, I just- I can’t Alex.”

“Hey, hey it’s okay.” Alex said. “Can I give you a hug?”

John nodded, and Alex squeezed him lightly.

“You know, Eliza mentioned that they have some three bedroom apartments for lease in her apartment complex. It’s only a couple of blocks from here and it’s right at the edge of the city. We could check it out this weekend if you really want to.”

John smiled, holding onto Alex just a little tighter than before.

Much like he promised, the three of them looked at the open apartments in Eliza’s building. They found one on the fourth floor with three bedrooms, two bathrooms and a balcony big enough to fit all of them. They even allow pets in the building.

All three of them sign the papers the next morning and moved in two weeks later. Shortly after, John buys a box turtle and names it Bernard.

For now, all of them are generally happy, and that is all that they need.


End file.
